my house, he wants money from it

[ONdad]

Originally Posted by dadtotheend

Are you saying that a common law does not participate in pension entitlements?

From what I've seen, only certain pensions are split, basically municipal pensions like OMERS. I'm trying to find cases where private company pensions are split, but I haven't so far, though I haven't spent a lot of time on it.

[dadtotheend]

Just because yours is bigger than hers doesn't necessarily mean anything.

It's the growth from cohab date to separation date that is equalized. Your RRSP may not have grown much and/or you bargained it away.

[rszalai]

There is a sticky right at the top of this forum about the differences of common law and marriage.

[dadtotheend]

Please provide link to thread.

[rszalai]

http://www.ottawadivorce.com/forum/f...-couples-1067/

[dadtotheend]

Thanks for that. It would appear that a claim for unjust enrichment will be a concern for whatnext because he was the breadwinner while she took care of the children.

[rszalai]

That's true. Unjust enrichment is very different from equalization. If someone claims unjust enrichment, it must be proved how much it is, and this can be the case in common law, but there is no automatic equalization. And this is the answer to the original question. He/she can't just get automatically half of the house, she/she doesn't get anything, until "unjust enrichment" in not proved.

[whatnext]

I didn't think they got half the pension if they were commonlaw unless they proved unjust whatever that they helped the person pay into their pension by cleaning house, watching kids and blah blah. not cut and dry

[whatnext]

Division of property from commonlaw relationships using unjust enrichment is very open to interpretation. One partners lawyer will say fight to keep it all, the other partner's lawyer will say fight to get as much as you can. One judge will decide this way, another will decide another way. The family lawyer in mediation will say it's a trust law issue; so see a trust lawyer to get a better answer than someone specializing in family law because it's not their specialty. (Though the family law lawyer will still try to suck you in for 10 sessions of mediation at 300.00/ hour that won't even resolve the issue that you walked in the door to solve. Do yourself a favour and download an online separation agreement. If you don't have big disputes why are you paying top dollar for mediation?) Mediation will result in finding a compromise amongst yourselves, which you could have done yourselves. All in all, if you can get along, stop lining the pockets of the well-heeled professionals and try to come up with a reasonable amount yourselves. Because that is all they will do at your expense.